OHOHO! Once more I hijack Mecha Guignol and corrupt it with live action-ness. No 2D loli traps for YOU! Bask upon 3D manliness in leather and spandex. OHOHOHO!

But srsly, this here’s a OOO, Den-O, All Riders: Let’s Go Kamen Rider movie review at the moment anyhow?

Since this is not a toku blog, I’ll provide a little background to this movie. It’s a crossover movie involving pretty much every Kamen Rider ever, but primarily focusing on Kamen Rider OOO, Den-O and the original Rider 1 and Rider 2. You don’t really need to watch any Kamen Rider to get this flick, although it helps if you’ve seen Den-O and the first few episodes of OOOs. It also wouldn’t hurt to know the premise of the original Kamen Rider.

That premise? A couple guys get kidnapped by an evil organization known as Shocker. They get turned into cyborgs (Rider 1 and Rider 2) but escape before they’re brainwashed to do Shocker’s bidding. They become “allies of justice” (aka superheroes).

There, now you know the premise, so onto the movie review.

It’s a pretty good movie, even if you’re not a hardcore fan of Kamen Rider. It’s sufficiently stand alone that you can still get it, but if you’ve watched Den-O and OOOs in particular (especially Den-O), a lot of things do make more sense. Especially one bit near the end when we start to see more Riders.

Where this movie differs from other Kamen Rider movies is that it has an actual plot that makes sense. With other Kamen Rider movies, it’s usually just a simple storyline designed to milk a character’s drama and culminate in a big battle. With OOO, Den-O, All Riders: Let’s Go Kamen Rider, we have an actual evolving story that’s actually akin to the kind of stories from stuff like Doctor Who.

The premise here is that the OOO crew met with the time traveling Den-O crew. They tag themselves along and due to the character of Ankh being an asshole, they caused history to change to where Shocker successfully took over the world. This prompts quite a bit of time traveling and even some neat time looping and stuff. There’s an actual foreshadowed part that was done with enough subtlety that the pay off actually succeeded as a surprise.

The heroes act pretty much like they usually do, but it’s the villains who are just plain awesome. There’s one scene where Shocker holds a televised UN meeting, and all the members of the UN are the other villainous organizations, such as G.O.D. and the Cult of Golgom. And some of the villains objected to turning part of the human population into monsters and killing the rest, because their respective organizations’ goal was complete genocide/destruction of the world.

There’s also cameos galore. Some of the cameos even make sense. If you’re into the franchise, you’ll get ‘em. If not, then they’re just neat monsters in the background. For instance, there’s a villain named Shadowmoon who’s often standing in the background. He really ought to be a primary antagonist, but it kinda makes sense for him to be a mere lieutenant if you consider that history’s been changed. Also, they had freaking Kame Bazooka! (He’s a turtle monster with a bazooka on his back, ala Blastoise). The movie’s just chalked full of this stuff. I’ve half a mind to re-watch it again to see if Starfish Hitler or Ant Capone might be standing in the background somewhere.

Aaaanyway, it’s a neat movie. It’s not necessarily a great gateway movie though. It’s got a good balance of story, action and cheesiness & fanservice (especially near the end) that should appeal to peeps who are already into the franchise or have an open mind about this stuff. But it probably wouldn’t convert a staunch objector to these kind of shows, since to fully appreciate how much the story actually makes sense, you really have to have seen Den-O.

But if you’ve got an open mind and some free time, then go ahead and watch it. It should be amusing. And Landon, this means you, you cur.